Competency #7: Summarize the challenges facing children who use supervised visitation services

            Very little research has been done specifically on the children in supervised visitation services. Jenkins, Park, and Peterson-Badali (1997) surveyed 31 children in visitation services and found that they were significantly more likely than their peers to have emotional and behavioral problems: they were eight times more likely to show “showed internalizing behavior in the clinical range” (e.g., “loneliness, withdrawal, fearfulness, depression, guilt, and somatic complaints”) and 14 times more likely to show “externalizing behaviors in the clinical range” (e.g., “destructiveness, stealing, swearing, aggression, and disobedience”) (p. 54).Although follow-up studies have not been conducted, the conclusion reached by these authors can be corroborated in another way. Namely, we know that most of the children in supervised visitation services have suffered abuse and/or been exposed to domestic violence and/or high-conflict parental separations, and numerous studies have shown that such children suffer greatly and in myriad ways.

Child Abuse. Casanueva, Dolan, Smith, Ringeisen, and Dowd (2012) found that children in the child welfare system were “at higher risk for poor health and negative developmental, behavioral/emotional, and cognitive outcomes than children in the general population” (p. 560). They found that children in the welfare system were almost twice as likely to have trauma symptoms and to suffer from depression as children in the general population (p. 555). Fusco and Cahalane (2014) found that 27 percent of children aged 3 to 5 in the child welfare system exhibited trauma symptoms (p. 47).

Domestic Violence. Pulido, Forrester, and Lacina (2011) note that studies have shown that children who have witnessed domestic violence exhibited symptoms “comparable to those of child abuse and neglect. Sleep difficulties, physical symptoms, increased aggression/anxiety or increased withdrawal, anxiety about separation from a caretaker, intrusive thoughts, depression, substance abuse and/or running away are commonly cited” (p. 383).

Parental Separation and/or Divorce. Dunn, Flory, and Berg-Weger (2004) cite numerous studies showing that “ongoing parental conflict is detrimental to children” (p. 60). Pulido, Forrester, and Lacina (2011) point out that it is common for “children who are going through the separation and/or divorce process to experience sleep difficulties, physical symptoms such as headaches and stomachaches, and increased anxiety about separation from the primary caregiver (p. 384).

Trauma Symptoms. Johnston and Straus (1999) examined “several samples of children of highly conflictual and violent families in custody disputes, all referred by family courts, some of whom had supervised visitation at one point in time” and found that in several key psychological areas they tested remarkably similar to a sample of traumatized children (pp. 138-139). Examples include the following.

Distrust. These children tended to be “hypervigilant and distrusting of others” (p. 141). They were “[w]atchful, guarded, and ever scanning for dangers,” viewing the world as “an uncooperative place” (p. 141). The authors explain:

Ordinarily, children derive their capacity for trust from the parents’ relatively predictable responsiveness to their basic needs as infants. Later, as toddlers and young children, they use their parents as references for what is safe and trustworthy in the world. Children traumatized within their own families, however, have the profound dilemma of making sense out of vastly contradictory views that are communicated through the chaos of their parents’ inconsistent behavior, hostility, fear, distrust, and emotional neediness. Consequently, these children become preoccupied with a tangle of questions: Who is safe? Who is dangerous? Whom can you trust? (140)

Withdrawn Behavior. “Unlike typically developing children, who turn to others, especially adults, to help them solve problems and interpret social reality, these children turned inward, to themselves,” becoming “increasingly withdrawn, distant, and unable to accept social support or influence, especially under conditions of stress” (p. 142).

Reality Distortion. These children “defend against the double-binding and inconsistency of their most significant relationships by avoiding ambiguity and complexity. In the service of their essential need for predictability and control, perceptions and ideas remain simplistic, concrete, and utilitarian. They are acutely uncomfortable with any psychological nuance; they prefer facts and tend to narrow and simplify their perceptual field to a manageable level” (p. 142). Given that these children tend to be so withdrawn, “there is little expectation that these distorted perceptions could be corrected by communication with others” (p. 142).

            Preoccupation with Placating Parents. These children have learned that, “in the service of staying safe and getting their own needs met,” they need to conceal their own feelings and cater to the wishes of their parents (p. 143). Consequently, “these children often have trouble directly asserting their own needs and wishes. Overt aggression is not a noticeable feature of these children. Instead, they are likely to maintain an underlying, negativistic, oppositional, and alienated stance that is masked by an apparent compliant eagerness to please others,” an act which “can be maintained only until they become overwhelmed by their own neediness, at which time they are likely to regress or explode into imitable, distressed, or demanding behavior” (p. 143). It is also worth noting that the self-worth of these children “in relation to others was typically diminished, underscoring how other-focused such children need to be in order to manage interpersonal risk” (p. 144).

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Casanueva, C., Dolan, M., Smith, K., Ringeisen, H., & Dowd, K. (2012). Indicators of

well-being among children in the United States child welfare system. Child Indicators Research, 5(3), 547-565.

Dunn, J.H., Flory, B.E., & Berg-Weger, M. (2004). An exploratory study of supervised

access and custody exchange services: The children’s experience. Family Court Review, 42(1), 60-73.

Fusco, R.A., & Cahalane, H. (2014). Young children in the child welfare system: What

factors contribute to trauma symptomology? Child Welfare, 92(5), 37-58

Jenkins, J.M., Park, N.W., & Peterson-Badali, M. (1997). An evaluation of supervised

access II: Perspectives of parents and children. Family and Conciliation Courts Review, 35(1), 51-65.

Johnston, J.R., & Straus, R.B. (1999). Traumatized children in supervised visitation:

What do they need? Family and Conciliation Courts Review, 37(2), 135-158.

Pulido, M.L., Forrester, S.P., and Lacina, J.M. (2011). Raising the bar: Why supervised

visitation providers should be required to meet standards for service provision. Family Court Review, 49(2), 379-387.